Ouachita Stories

Dr. Margaret “Maggie” Garrett, associate professor of music at Ouachita Baptist University, will present a faculty cabaret, “Everything Changes,” on Thursday, April 12, at 7:30 p.m. John Alec Briggs, lecturer in music at Ouachita, serves as the music director and collaborative pianist for the show. The performance, which is free and open to the public, will be held in Ouachita’s McBeth Recital Hall in Mabee Fine Arts Center.

“The recital focuses on my work while I was on sabbatical. The work seems particularly poignant to mothers of small children, those who have lost a loved one and those dealing with anxiety and depression,” Garrett said. “Creating this cabaret has been a labor of love. It is a reminder that there can be joy and humor amid pain and loss.”

Actress Kelli Barrett, Garrett’s cabaret coach, helped co-write the cabaret. Since the creation of the show in the fall of 2016, Garrett and Briggs have performed the work at Ouachita, Blue Mountain College and Arkansas Tech University. They also have been selected to present the cabaret at the National Association of Teachers of Singing National Conference in Las Vegas in June.

The cabaret will weave together a range of selections, including musical theatre pieces such as Stephen Sondheim’s “Children Will Listen” from Into the Woods and Sara Bareilles’ “Everything Changes” from Waitress to Disney songs like Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez’s “Let It Go” from Frozen. Songs from popular music, including Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ on a Prayer” and “Survivor” by Destiny’s Child, will be featured alongside the popular children’s song “London Bridge Is Falling Down” and George Beverly Shea’s hymn “I’d Rather Have Jesus.”

Garrett joined the Ouachita music faculty in 2008. She earned a Bachelor of Music degree in voice performance from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, a Master of Music degree in voice performance from Indiana University-Bloomington and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in voice performance from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, as well as high school concentrations in voice and harp from Baltimore School for the Arts. Garrett has won the Kentucky National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Artist Awards competition and has received the NATS Young Leaders Award. She is a member of NATS, National Opera Association, Pi Kappa Lambda National Music Honor Society, Sigma Alpha Iota International Music Fraternity, Arkadelphia Philharmonic Club and the Musical Theatre Educators’ Alliance.

Garrett has presented recitals in Arkansas and surrounding states and has performed as an oratorio soloist in Handel’s Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Fauré’s Requiem, Haydn’s Creation, Brahms’ German Requiem, Bach’s Magnificat and Vivaldi’s Gloria. As an orchestral soloist, she has performed Mozart’s Exsultate, jubilate, Glière’s Concerto for Coloratura Soprano and Orchestra and Ligeti’s Mysteries of the Macabre. She has been a featured artist with Opera in Concert in Dallas, Texas; other opera credits include the title role in Little Red Riding Hood, Mabel in Pirates of Penzance, Sandrina in La Finta Giardiniera, Laurie in The Tender Land and Mary, the Mother of Jesus, in the world premiere of Rendezvous with Destiny. She also has performed with the Kentucky Opera, Piedmont Opera, Opera Carolina and the Indiana University Opera Theater. Her musical theatre credits include My Fair Lady, A Little Night Music, The Most Happy Fella, Once Upon a Mattress and Grease.

Briggs joined the Ouachita faculty in 2011. He has written and performed three solo cabaret shows, which were seen in New York and on cruise ships around the world. All three were selected as “must-see shows of the week” by Time Out New York. Briggs earned a Bachelor of Music degree in vocal performance from Ouachita and attended graduate school at Louisiana State University, where he studied voice with Martina Arroyo, Robert Grayson and Sandra Kungle and organ with Herndon Spillman. He currently is completing graduate studies in voice pedagogy at Westminster Choir College. Briggs also earned a Master of Architecture degree from Tulane University. His scenic design credits include How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (with John Arnone), Broadway; Jekyll & Hyde (with Robin Phillips and James Noone), Broadway and first national tour (winner, 1997 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Set Design of a Musical); Of Mice and Men, Lizzie Borden and Rex (with John Conklin), New York City Opera; and Debbie Allen’s Brothers of the Knight (with Ray Klausen), The Kennedy Center. Television production credits include Gala for the President at Ford’s Theatre, The Daytime Emmy Awards and The Miss America Pageant (all with Klausen). Briggs currently also serves as choirmaster and organist at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Little Rock, Ark.

Barrett, a Virginia Beach, Va., native, now lives and works in New York City, acting both on stage and in film. In addition to serving as Garrett’s coach and co-writer, she has taught Ouachita students through the Amy Murphy Studio NYC Professional Intensive. Barrett and her husband, Tony-nominated Jarrod Spector, collaborate in their cabaret on marriage, “This Is Dedicated: Music’s Greatest Marriages.” Barrett currently is filming the TV series The Blacklist: Redemption; other television credits include appearances on BrainDead, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Blue Bloods, NCIS and Chicago Fire. Film credits include Zarra’s Law, Mr. Popper’s Penguins and The Switch. On Broadway, she recently originated the leading role of Lara in Doctor Zhivago and has performed in Baby It’s You!, The Royal Family and Wicked and originated the role of Sherrie in Rock of Ages Off-Broadway. She studied musical theatre at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pa.

For more information, contact Dr. Maggie Garrett at [email protected] or (870) 245-5271.

 

By Sarah Davis

April 6, 2018